Observations
by secretwriter18
Summary: This is a Kurt Fanfiction, no pairings. More of a drabble, really... Anyway, read and review! Rated T because of emotional content, and my own sense of paranoia.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note: This one-shot is dedicated to a friend of mine on twitter who is trying to improve her English. So, this is for you, iKurt. **

**As always, enjoy and review.**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

Chapter One: Observations

_**I wondered, for a moment, how he did it every day of his life… How he put up with the slushies, the dumpster dives… How he ignored all of the jokes at his expense. I don't know how he does it, but he has more back bone than many people at this school. It's so easy to bully, to tear at someone when you know all of their faults. It's too easy to take out your anger on those who are weaker, those who are unable to defend themselves because they don't have the faith that they will be able to overcome the way you torment them.**_

_**It's easy to put your inadequacies on the back burner while you rip the self-worth of others. It's all too easy to ignore how you have the same faults as them but never show it. It doesn't take a back bone to call someone a name, or to shove a smaller kid out of the way. It doesn't take an ounce of thought or kindness to sneer at someone. It's too easy to be cruel in a world that has become so unforgiving. **_

_** What takes courage, what takes grit and perseverance, is for a person to be the victim, to be the target-and for them to rise again after each blow. What takes more backbone than anyone on the football team at William McKinley High possesses, is for the person to show up and proudly be the way they were, as if nothing had ever happened the day before.**_

_**I wished that I had that kind of inner strength, that kind of perseverance, but I knew I could never be like him, could never hold my head up high after they called me all of those names or got my face bitch slapped by an iceberg(i.e. slushied). He had courage when I didn't…but he probably didn't call it courage.**_

_**He would probably say that someone needed to take a stand against the bullies in the school, so he did it. He would say that there was nothing else he could do-did people honestly expect him not to get right back up and go on? He wasn't made of glass, he was no porcelain doll, he would tell people in that haughty voice of his.**_

_** He would laugh when people called him delicate, even though he looked like he could use a few good hearty meals… He would insist that he was proud of who he was when he was asked if he ever let all of the taunting get to him, if he ever wished he wasn't like was. He wouldn't complain when people purposely shied away from him, as if what he was was a disease….**_

_**No one saw beyond the walls he had put up, because that was the one thing that he did best-protect himself from any more emotional damage than was necessary. He would smile, and laugh, obsess over the most mundane things, berate the students around him for their lack of knowledge on fashion. He probably congratulated himself on the fact that he hid everything so well….**_

_**Or, well, he thought he did.**_

_**What no one else saw, I did.**_

_**And I knew that no matter how many smiles he smiled, no matter how many diva fits he threw, he would always be the small boy inside who wanted a way out.**_

_**I alone noticed how he would recoil, how he hesitated at physical touch from his friends. I noticed how pain would flash in his eyes every time one of his "friends" would say that "It's okay, he's gay", like he didn't want to be with the guys, or be considered masculine instead of feminine. No one (with the exception of me) noticed how sad his voice sounded, with just a touch of bitterness, as he said, he was "an honorary girl".**_

_**The thought that a boy at his age knew such pain and such torture at such a young age infuriated me. **_

_**So what if he wanted to be on Broadway, or liked Lady Gaga, or wore designer clothes?**_

_**So what if he was as gay as a purple elephant with heart spots?**_

_**Did those things make him any less of a person? Did it make him any less worthy to live out his high school career in peace?**_

_**Did it make it right for people to torture and taunt him? Did it make it right for all of those people to treat him as if he were diseased?**_

_**No, it didn't. It wasn't right…. None of it was excusable.**_

_**But what could you do? Tell the principle? Ha. What a joke. No one in the entire damn town would stand up for a boy who would give his life for them when asked. The boy had given up the best moment of his career by singing a bad note just so his father wouldn't be harassed any more. No one else, besides the few members of the Glee Club, had that much courage.**_

_**And the saddest part was that the one who tortured him was just as gay as he was, if not more so.**_

I sighed, hearing the school bell in the distant corners of my brain. Another day of school was about to begin, and another round of torture for those who just wanted to get away from the hell hole. I picked up my bag, and headed for the inside of the school, where I would exchange my books for more torturous spines, ones that involved numbers rather than letters. I went with the crowd like I always did, heading for my locker.

As I opened it, I heard a familiar voice-the high pitched tones were so well attuned to my ears that I automatically tuned into him whenever he spoke. I looked up as he walked by, arm in arm with a friend of his. His blue eyes, so unusual like the boy himself, never left the screen of his phone….

But, for a split second, he glanced up. Our eyes met, and I did the only thing I could do for the boy who refused to show pain or anguish or emotional weakness.

I smiled at Kurt Hummel, praying that he would get the hell out of Lima, Ohio when he graduated.


	2. Chapter 2Memories, Slushies, and Notes

Chapter 2: Disconnected

His surprise was cleverly masked as he saw the smile and the sincerity in the grey blue eyes behind it.

I wondered, as I closed the locker, how long it would take him to realize that people did truly care, and there were places for him to go to that weren't in secret… that weren't hotlines for suicidal teens. I could recall the day when his façade began to truly crumble around him. The memory tore at my heart, but as I slid into the seat in my mathematics class, I let it wash over me, accepting that when his pain was shared, it would make his somehow less…

_The school had been deserted for thirty minutes or more, and I was running late, having wanted to avoid Schue and Sylvester's arguments again. I had come down the hallway, about to turn a corner, when I heard an enraged familiar voice._

_His friend, his partner in crime, had cornered him after his "football practice", before he had decided to be proud of whom he was destined to be. I heard the words she tossed at him-why he hadn't confided in her, why he hadn't came to her and let her get him real help. _

_Vulnerability in its cruelest form presented itself in hot headed anger._

_I had never been afraid of the fragile looking boy, but the fire in his eyes was one of humiliation and pain-a fire fueled by the fear of rejection and the pain of reality made him look threatening, as if he really could have hurt the colored girl._

"_**Why do you keep holding onto this idea that I'm a fag, Mercedes? Do you want me to be? Do you want me to become one and become the laughing stock of the school? Have you ever considered that there are other reasons for me calling the hotline? Maybe, I don't know, I have a dead mother and my father suffered from a heart attack. He's been in the hospital for so long that I'm going crazy, and all anyone can seem to think about is that my sexual orientation is wrong! There are other problems in my life than guys who like guys Mercedes-maybe my problem is you, since you won't leave me the hell alone about this!"**_

_The bags beneath his eyes said so much more than his shrieked words did._

_The redness that rimmed his eyes said so much more than the clenched jaw he had._

_The slouched posture, the defeated air about him spoke volumes more than the hateful, spiteful tone he used._

_It was so obvious that he was hiding it, all of the viscerally real and constantly swirling conflicted feelings behind what was going on in his life, when his best friend couldn't see that she was right on the marker._

_Instead of fighting, she swallowed his words and her tears, believing the lies he told her in the heat of the moment._

_She swallowed it all so easily when the messages he was shouting was contradicted by the way his body bended to accept defeat-the defeat that he could never let his mind dream of who he wanted to be in this small hell hole for the person who he was deep inside._

_His face was red, his eyes watering as he told her to back off, to stop calling him something that he would never be._

_He was too defensive as he told her that he was simply flamboyant-couldn't he be what he wanted in the town where he had grown up? _

_What was so wrong with liking fashion, he had challenged her, still ranting as she tried to back track and soothe the fire she had ignited._

_She reassured him with meaningless words before making a hasty escape for the school doors._

_Her retreat was too quick-and he let defeat take over his form after she had disappeared through the doors. He slumped against the locker, emotional walls falling as he let the tears overflow, quiet sobs and whimpers of emotional pain escaping…_

_As I silently slipped by him, I pulled a small packet of tissues out of my purse and put them on top of his book that had fallen to the floor in the midst of his rant._

_I looked back, and he never knew I was there at all, because he was still crying out his anguish when I pulled out of the school's parking lot._

The bell rang dimly again, and the class filed out eagerly. Science was next-and I wondered how much longer this day would have to last. I wondered how much more pain he would be put through.

A tall male cut in front of me in the hallway as I headed to the class I would never take notes in. It was too easy for me to pass the class, which left me more time to muse over the things that seemed to be on an eternal loop in my cranium. I sighed and kept walking behind him, resisting the urge to push the jock, to jar him a little and think someone else had done it… I resisted the urge to piss him off and humiliate him, even if he deserved it. I followed the crowd-but as I crossed into another hallway, I saw a sight that made my heart freeze.

Tall and lanky, he was cornered again by the jocks who thought he was despicable.

Before a cry could leave my throat, the icy blue substance flew from the cup and onto his impeccable suit, his perfectly coifed hair.

I felt my heart shatter as I saw their laughter. I was forced into the room I belonged in by a hand on my shoulder, a voice whispering in my ear. She was talking low in my war, and looked like she was gossiping; in reality, she was whispering in my ear that it wasn't worth it to make a spectacle of myself. She was telling me, in her odd and rash way that let me know she cared that it wasn't worth becoming a social pariah like he was…and my heart screamed out while my body numbly followed the person. Though I knew how to hide the pain well, it was obvious it showed now in this moment of weakness; I knew she could see the pain in my face, and snapped at a fellow classmate who had stared a second too long. Her tone was bitchy, asking if he had never seen a girl who was having menstrual cramps. I would have blushed, would have protested if I wasn't in the middle of emotionally collapsing.

What seemed like an eternity later, she none too gently shoved me into a seat, taking one beside me with eerie, cat like grace that didn't match her callous tone and even more callous demeanor.

The teacher's voice was dull and monotone as the lesson began. A piece of paper slid in front of me what seemed like seconds later.

_You okay, kid? What happened this morning?_

_**I'm fine, but he's not. And nothing happened. Just tired since I stayed up, studying for my Trigonometry test and all.**_

_So you become an emotional three year old over Hummel? What the hell? He's a big boy, and you need to get over this "emotional connection" bull shit._

_**Fuck off, CheeriO. I don't see you rushing to defend him. And what the hell are you playing at, playing both sides of the enemy lines?**_

_I'll admit I'm playing both sides of the table-but you have no reason to. You should be loyal to the jock side of things, shouldn't you?_

_**Look, Santana, I know you mean well, but your version of logic isn't helping things. I gide it well enough, and if I slip up, then it'll all be my fault, and you can have a party to congratulate me on my sudden social decline. However, until that day comes, you will get off my ass about it. Am I clear?**_

_As mud. And you might not want to push Azimio in the hallway like you looked like you wanted to. It's a bad idea to push a guy twice your size._

_**Leave me alone. I'm a good student who needs no distractions, which you are providing in full force.**_

She rolled her eyes at the last sentence, but tucked the piece of paper in her notebook, leaving me to her thoughts as she leaned back in her seat. Her face resumed a completely emotionless state as I wondered the last emotional question for that period:

_Would I ever be able to face the people that tortured him, or be able to show support for him like the others did that stood by him?_

The answer my heart gave me made me want to cry again:

Hoping something would come true doesn't make it so. Actions do.


End file.
